A limited constitutional government calls for a rules-based, freemarket monetary system, not the topsy-turvy fiat dollar that now exists under central banking. This issue of the Cato Journal examines the case for alternatives to central banking and the reforms needed to move toward free-market money.

The more widespread use of body cameras will make it easier for the American public to better understand how police officers do their jobs and under what circumstances they feel that it is necessary to resort to deadly force.

Americans are finally enjoying an improving economy after years of recession and slow growth. The unemployment rate is dropping, the economy is expanding, and public confidence is rising. Surely our economic crisis is behind us. Or is it? In Going for Broke: Deficits, Debt, and the Entitlement Crisis, Cato scholar Michael D. Tanner examines the growing national debt and its dire implications for our future and explains why a looming financial meltdown may be far worse than anyone expects.

The Cato Institute has released its 2014 Annual Report, which documents a dynamic year of growth and productivity. “Libertarianism is not just a framework for utopia,” Cato’s David Boaz writes in his book, The Libertarian Mind. “It is the indispensable framework for the future.” And as the new report demonstrates, the Cato Institute, thanks largely to the generosity of our Sponsors, is leading the charge to apply this framework across the policy spectrum.

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The New Russia and the New Eurasia

For anyone interested in what’s going on in Eurasia, specifically Russia and its relations with all of the other nations of the continent, I highly recommend watching or listening to the Cato Institute’s policy forum today on “Russian Energy Policy and the New Russian State.” (I’m not sure when the video and audio will be archived for online streaming, but it will be very soon). Robert Amsterdam, Attorney for jailed Russian oil entrepreneur (and now political prisoner) Mikhail Khodorkovsky, made some very sharp and interesting comments about what is happening to the rule of law in Russia. Andrei Illarionov, former Economic Adviser to President Putin, then laid out the course of Russia’s energy policies under President Putin and explained the disastrous effects of those policies of re-nationalization (which has taken place alongside a coincident “privatization” of the Russian state, which is coming rapidly under the control of a KGB-corporate-state network) on the Russian economy, on the legal system of the Russian Federation, and on the long-term prospects of liberty in Russia.

Interest in the topic is increasing, as shown by Sunday’s Washington Post, which had a very insightful article on developments in Russia. As the article shows, Russian businessmen such as Vladislav Tetyukhin are strong-armed into turning control of their firms over to the ruling elites:

Last year, Tetyukhin was invited to tea at the Moscow headquarters of Rosoboronexport, and the conversation, he said, quickly took an unpleasant but not unexpected turn. Executives from Rosoboronexport told him that they wanted to buy a controlling stake in the titanium concern. The tea, he said, suddenly did not taste so sweet.

At first, Tetyukhin and Bresht publicly protested any sale of their shares, but their company quickly found itself under investigation by the tax police, and the prosecutor’s office launched an inquiry into VSMPO-Avisma’s share structure. Before it was acquired by VSMPO, Avisma, a raw materials supplier, was owned by Khodorkovsky, a potentially dangerous connection.

Rosoboronexport said it planned to move into the metals industry to “prevent the enterprises of the metallurgy sector from being usurped by various organizations, including those acting in the interests of foreign capital and using illegal methods.”